1 Roger L. Mordhorst. Born 1947. TRANSCRIPT of OH 1780V This interview was recorded on November 21, 2010. The interviewer is Mary Ann Williamson. The interview also is available in video format, filmed by Alexandro Sanders. The interview was transcribed by Susan Becker. ABSTRACT: Roger Mordhorst is an artist who was evacuated from his house twice during the Fourmile Canyon Fire of 2010. He talks about what he took with him when he evacuated, his unsuccessful struggle to cage his pet parrot, and the subsequent successful evacuation of the parrot by an animal rescue crew. He also talks about using time that he had back at his house before his second evacuation as a time to finish work on paintings without distraction. He says that he took artwork when he left but did not think of taking more mundane, practical items such as passport and checkbook. NOTE: This interview is one of a series about the Fourmile Fire of 2010. It was recorded as footage to be used in the making of the documentary movie PACKED and was later donated to the Maria Rogers Oral History Program for archiving. The interviewer s questions and comments appear in parentheses. Added material appears in brackets. [A]. 00:00 My name is Roger Mordhorst. The date is November 21, 2010, and my address 6778 Olde Stage Road [?]. (Okay. Let's talk about the day of the Fourmile Canyon Fire when you got the call to evacuate, or even we'll go back before that. Tell me about how you knew about the fire and when you knew it was time to evacuate.) Well, it was that morning, it was a Monday morning (I'm sorry. Can I stop you? Just go back and reincorporate the question [Note: interviewer is interviewing for material to use in a film about the Fourmile Fire, PACKED, and as such prompts the narrator to answer in full sentences so the material can be used in the documentary film.]) Okay. [voice of Mary Ann Williamson's business partner, Angie Burnam:] She's not even in the film; just you. Right. I understand that. The question is could you rephrase the question?
2 (Well, how did I phrase it? Just tell me the ) When I first became aware of the fire, that morning, I looked up, and I saw a bunch of smoke in the south out the window. And I had two friends who had just come up, and they spent, oh, an hour or so here, visiting, and then they left. And they called me back, and they said, "There's this big fire. It looks like it might be near you. Are you aware of that?" And I said, "No. Well, I noticed there was a lot of smoke out there, but I hadn't heard anything yet." And so I turned on the television to see if I could get any news. And then just kind of stayed around here. I thought that it was further south. It wasn't really a danger to me. So I kind of hung out that day, and it was later in the afternoon, the smoke seemed to dissipate. It seemed to be getting better. And that's when they came around, and they evacuated me. I did get a call earlier that day that said: "be prepared to evacuate." And then they did come around. I guess the reverse-911 wasn't working or something, and they came around. And eventually a police officer came to the door and said, "You need to get out" that the fire may come this way. So I gathered what things I could my dog and dog food and a change of clothes and called a friend in Longmont to see if I could stay with her. And she said, "Yeah, come on." I'd stayed with her the last time I was evacuated, so that s who I thought of immediately. Then I cleared out of here, but I couldn't get my parrot I have a 25-year-old bluefronted Amazon parrot into the travel cage. He was just too scared, he didn't want to do it. I spent probably an hour trying to get him in there. So I finally just thought, well, I ll probably be allowed back up in a day or so, so I'll leave him. I stocked him up with food and water, and I left. And of course it was three days, four days, later before I was allowed back up. On the third day, I came back and I went to the roadblock and asked if I could feed my bird at least. And they said, "No, we can't allow you in the area, but animal rescue is going to be in the area today. They can pick your parrot up." And they gave me a telephone number. So I went back and I called them, and they said, "Oh yeah, we'll get it." I left the door open, thinking that maybe someone might come in and rescue my bird. And they did. They called me that night and said that they had him; he was fine. And in fact, he jumped into their cages so lonesome, I think they didn't have any problem getting him into one of those carry-all animal cages. He was riding along in their truck with a bunch of dogs and cats. He was laughing and talking the whole time. They said, "This is the best pet we've had all day. We just love your bird." And they even gave me a carry-all cage to take home. So that worked out perfectly well. And it was good to have him back that day.
3 But then it was the next day, on Thursday, that they said they were allowing people to come back up to pack up their valuables, and they thought this was going to be just a temporary thing. So I came back up here that morning. The water was off and the cable and internet we didn't have electricity. I sat up here, and I thought about what I should take. I really didn't have too many ideas, but I knew that I wanted to paint. I had to get some paintings ready for shows. And I'd lost three days. 04:45 So I sat down instead of loading stuff up, I sat down and painted. I tried to finish three paintings. I worked on those. I was inspired. I just got really involved in that, and everything else just kind of went away. I didn't have any distractions, didn't have the telephone or anything else. So I was able to complete three of the paintings that I needed to do before they came back up and said, "We need you to evacuate again. The fire's on the other side of the hill. And it's coming your way. The winds are supposed to pick up tonight. So you need to evacuate." And then he looked at my van and he said, "Did you just get here?" Because he noticed I didn't have anything in my van. I said, "No, I've been here all day." I never even explained it to him. So then I went, and I got my paintings, I got a bunch of things, artwork and I thought I'll bring my oil paintings, and I'll be able to paint at the location I was going to. But that's all. I didn't get my passport or checkbook or anything else. I completely forgot all the stuff that you're probably supposed to take. And that's basically my story. Do you have any questions? (I think I have a few. I think it's a great story, first of all. It really speaks to how an artist reacts, and how some other people would react. So I love it. When you got to your friend's house in Longmont for the second time, was there anything that you said, Ah, gee I should have taken that. ) Well, yeah, you do think about that. My passport, for instance. [interviewer has him start over, in order to incorporate question into answer] I'm sorry. There was something [has him start again discussion about not rocking in his chair while talking] When I got back after being evacuated the second time, I went through in my mind what I should have taken. I started to go over that in my mind, and I came up with some things that probably would have been a good idea I mean, you think about your birth certificate even though I've never needed my birth certificate that I can recall for the last 30 or 40 years that probably might have been something I should have taken. My passport. Checkbook. Things like that that I didn't have. Important papers, that I might have. I thought about all that. And I still, I think, was in denial I still believed
4 that my house was going to be okay. I tend to be an optimist, and I just felt that everything was going to be okay. It's going to be a temporary thing, and I'll be back in the house in a couple of days. Which as it turns out, came to pass, fortunately. But I know people who lost everything in that fire. It's not true that everybody [remarks by interviewer and videographer about narrator moving in his chair.] (Is there anything of sentimental value that you wish you had taken?) Things that have sentimental value like a lot of my paintings from the past I had a show up at NCAR at the time, so I had twenty-nine things out, but I still have a bunch of paintings from over the years that would have been lost. And I definitely thought about that that, and I should have taken some more of those. I did take a few. Some that I had been working on. There were other things. Photographs I had tons of photographs. I never took any of those. I thought those could be lost. I did take my hard drive from my computer. I remembered to take that the second time. A lot of those photographs are on there, and that would have been saved. Other than that, I didn't really think of anything major that I wish I had taken. 09:37 (Thank you. I'm interested in this zone that you went into while all this mayhem was going on around you. [laughs] How were you able to get out of that frame of mind and get into the painting again, when you came back?) I have been painting there's this zone that I get into when I paint. There's this creative side I hone in on the painting, it just becomes my whole world and the rest of the world is blocked out. So out of practice, because I do that a lot, I was able to sit down in here without any distractions not even any music or radio or anything and just get into that zone where I zeroed in on the painting, and I was able to finish things. I tried to finish one painting for like five years I'd work on it a little bit, and I d set it aside for maybe a couple of years, and come back and do some more, and I finally put the finishing touches on that one painting. For some reason, this gave me the impetus, the desire, to finish that up. And take it and get it ready to go for the show that I had coming up. (So, what do you think that says about you, that you were able to just go there with your artwork?) I don't know, I felt kind of ashamed to even tell anybody about it afterwards. I thought people will think I'm nuts or something. What it says about me? I don't know. It's probably not a normal reaction. But I did talk to a friend another friend who was evacuated who said she went and worked on her garden when they let her back up. So maybe there are other people who have similar experiences. I don't know.
5 (Thank you.) 11:41 End of interview